Tag Archives: small

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Meadow, Tarn, and Trees

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Meadow, Tarn, and Trees
Small trees near timberline grow in a meadow surrounding a subalpine tarn

Meadow, Tarn, and Trees. © Copyright 2018 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Small trees near timberline grow in a meadow surrounding a subalpine tarn

In the Sierra Nevada photographers are nearly always grateful for clouds. There is a reason that these mountains are referred to as the “range of light” — there is a lot of light! In the summer months we often experience many days of perfect blue skies, often without a single cloud in sight, at least if you don’t include jet contrails from the many routes passing above the range. Clouds play a small part in this photograph, but I think they make a difference.

I made the photograph very near Tioga Pass, along the Sierra crest. I rarely photograph in this specific spot since it can be busy place and it is a bit overdone. (I have plenty of work in my archives that I have photographed from right around here.) But on this day the late light, as the sun was just about to pass behind the tall ridge to the west, was both warm and softened by the clearing overcast. So I stopped and wandered briefly into this intimate landscape of trees, meadow, and tarn.

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G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
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Photographs: Coastal Redwoods, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Redwood National & State Parks

Redwoods Great And Small

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Redwoods Great And Small
Dense Northern California redwood forest containing both old-growth and young trees

Redwoods Great And Small. © Copyright 2018 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Dense Northern California redwood forest containing both old-growth and young trees

I’ve lived on the fringes of California’s coastal redwoods ever since my family moved to the state when I was four-years-old. For years we did weekend trips to places like Big Basin Redwoods State Park, often hiking through the trees and beyond. So I have always been familiar with these extraordinarily tall trees and with the special forests they inhabit. However, it wasn’t until much later that I understood how truly rare the original old-growth forests are. I recently read that only 5% of the original forest was left mostly untouched — meaning that 95% of the trees (19 out of 20!) were cut down during a fairly short period, mostly in the 20th century. This was an astounding example of where greed can push humankind, and we can reasonably imagine that without intervention all of the old-growth forests would have been lost forever. If that greed had gotten its way, you would have to reimagine scenes like this one with only the slender trees on the right, because certain parties would have cut up every accessible tree like the one on the left.

Today it seems bizarre to recall the strong objections to saving these remnants back when the Redwood National Park was first proposed. Even conserving parts of the last 5% of the ancient forests seemed to be a bridge to far for interests blinded by their long-term investments in a nearly depleted natural resource, and they fought bitterly against that parks. There are several lessons in this. This was not isolated resistance to conservation — it has been the pattern with the creation of essentially all of our great American parks and other efforts to protect wilderness and natural areas. There are [i]always[/i] a few very loud voices shrieking that the protection of a few last remnants of America’s great landscape will ruin their economy. (Witness the Utah minority today working to undo national monuments.) However, now that our park system is well over a century old, it is plainly obvious that virtually every single protected area is regarded as a treasure and virtually no sane person would argue that we did the wrong thing by protecting them.

See top of this page for Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information and more.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Dogwood and Granite, Autumn

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Dogwood and Granite, Autumn
A small dogwood tree with autumn colors against the face of a granite boulder

Dogwood and Granite, Autumn. Yosemite Valley, California. October 21, 2017. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A small dogwood tree with autumn colors against the face of a granite boulder

I’m certainly not the only photographer in Yosemite Valley to be intrigued by the juxtaposition of (near) permanent granite and impermanent seasonal subjects, but how can anyone resist? Such opportunities are everywhere, given that the valley is ringed by granite cliffs and filled with large reminders that chunks of these cliffs do periodically break loose and fall into the valley below. We often seem surprised with the news of a rock slide in the Valley, but even a little familiarity with the place makes it obvious that these are the rule and not the exception. Giant rock piles sit at the bases of cliffs. Recent slides are visible. And almost everywhere in the Valley, often surprisingly far from the cliffs, there are gigantic boulders that could only have arrived there from one source.

I happened upon this yellow autumn dogwood and its boulder while driving along one of the valley roads. Yes, that is almost an embarrassing admission — though most of my photographs of this type come while hiking. It was one of those moments when I catch a glimpse of something out of the corner of my eye, immediately pull over (from driving or hiking) and see if I can find a photograph in it. Since I’ve already admitted to finding this photograph while driving, how about another admission? The biggest challenge of making this photograph? Waiting for the leaves to stop swinging back and forth in the breeze created by passing cars!

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Nevada

Ring Of Aspens

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Ring Of Aspens
Two autumn aspens in a small clearing, surrounded by a circular grove of larger trees

Ring Of Aspens. Great Basin National Park, Nevada. September 27, 2017. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Two autumn aspens in a small clearing, surrounded by a circular grove of larger trees

Thinking that I would like to explore some new areas, in late September I headed out to Great Basin National Park along the eastern border of Nevada, just a few miles from Utah. I picked this time to go since I knew that Utah aspen color can peak than that in California — late September rather than early October — and I figured that the same calendar might work in Nevada. I made the long (12 hour!) drive from the San Francisco Bay Area to Baker, Nevada in a day, and the next morning I set out to enjoy a rare thing — the first experience in a new (to me) national park. To describe it briefly, much of the park encompasses and mountain range among the many found in Nevada’s basin and range country. The highest peak is over 13,000′ tall and even supports a small glacier. This high area is, at least to most people, on of the two main features of the park. The other is Lehman Caves, which I did not visit on this trip.

While much of Nevada is “basin,” and therefore dry and without a ton of vegetation, these mountain ranges can support a lot of life. They are often covered with forests, and there are lots of aspens if you look in the right places. The aspens were high on my list of photographic targets. But it seemed that I may have slightly miscalculated on the dates of peak color, and when I arrived many of the trees were still quite green. (Others had apparently just dropped leaves, and late in the visit I finally did “discover” a less-traveled canyon with lots of colorful trees.) I found one lookout high in the mountains from which I could look across a large valley, and in this valley there are quite a few aspens — solid groves of them and other trees interspersed with the conifers. This small grove caught my attention with its unusual arrangement — a ring of trees surrounding a couple of isolated trees.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | LinkedIn | Email

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.